mylesgm wrote:Your black n white question is also part of the problem myles.....

All due respect Mark but no, my black and white question is actually part of the solution. Do wanna be bar tenders do internships? how about the management staff? what about the bouncers? Intern cleaners? No, they all start at minimum wage and are either trained before they get to the gig and prove themselves on the job or they receive training on the job. We need the older experienced generation to say to our employers no, young people in our industry will not be exploited they will get paid just like any other employee. We are not training institutions and so we shouldn't expect "students" to come to us for learning, they can learn on the job after they have already developed skills and nobody who's ever asked me for a job didn't already have skills.Not that you don't have skills and experience to share Mark but if you want additional staff at your place of work then they should get paid, if you need to make sure they have skills before you employ them then hold an interview, f they are just going to hang out and see if the work is for them then that is not an intern.

I, like most guys my age, started out in live sound pushing boxes, lifting heavy things and rolling leads, whilst getting paid, whether in beer and weed, cash, or all of the above. Times change and I'm pretty sure having half cut 17 year olds as roadies is frowned upon these days...

Kids are investing in themselves and doing formal education, before they ever make a cent in the industry. They skip straight over the long hard apprenticeship I did. (Most crews I see on big shows are dinosaurs like me, uneducated, unqualified, still pushing boxes and being managed by tertiary educated guys half our age. Not many young people see it as the way into the industry or as a cool thing to do on a Friday night.)

We drilled the importance of education into the millenials, they got educated and now we tell them they should work for nothing. There are lots of keen young people wandering around with a cert IV in sound production (or music management) and a $10K HECS/HELP debt. Give some of them actual jobs, they already know a lot more than many of us did when we started.

I think you would be surprised to see what actual real opportunities are out there for kids.Although I see both sides, I also see that free internships like this in todays world are fraught with legal concerns.I would not let my son or daughter go into an arrangement like that today and I dont think it is necessary. If its worth having someone there then its worth paying them. But I get the feeling there is more to this particular scenario then just a "free internship"."Just trying to help someone break into the Live mixing scene" ..Call me cynical but nothing today is that cut and dry there is always more motive to it.

I was going to post along the lines of what Kurt said with plenty of guys AND girls doing the sound certificate cources available. Its surprising the work some have landed too. I had a young fellat come to me and ask if he could sit in on some live jobs i was doing and I just explained the basics of the job and how to wrap leads, trip hazards on stage etc etc. He then went on to do SAE and got a job doing audio editing in a TV news room. First just editing then after six months he was in the hot seat doing some jobs under pressure live to air etc. Him and his mates rented a warehouse out and opened up a studio to follow their music passion while doing the TV job as their day job. Sort of looks like not a bad way to go at my end of the passage of time. Most youngn's are a lot more switched on to be wanting to break into the industry by doing an internship. Why not hire a few audio course graduates on a temp roster and pick the ones that you prefer as more permanent workers. Those who are keen and have done music industry skills cert 3 or 4 at yr 12 V Cal in victoria would be ideal candidates.